US Senate Votes To Allow Witnesses, Prolonging Trump Trial
The US Senate voted Saturday to allow witnesses at the impeachment trial of Donald Trump, a surprise move likely to extend the proceedings, even as the top Republican senator said he would vote to acquit the former president of inciting the deadly January 6 assault on the Capitol.
Republican Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s decision to acquit means Trump is unlikely to be convicted by the Senate of inciting an insurrection by his supporters.
The second impeachment trial of the 74-year-old former Republican president had been expected to conclude with final arguments and a verdict on Saturday.
But in a surprise move that could potentially prolong the trial for an undetermined time, the lead House impeachment manager, Jamie Raskin, said he wanted to call a Republican lawmaker as a witness.
“We believe we’ve proven our case,” Raskin said, but he wanted Representative Jamie Herrera Beutler to testify because she can provide an “additional critical piece of corroborating evidence.”
Raskin’s demand prompted a threat by Trump’s defense lawyers to call witnesses of their own, including Vice President Kamala Harris, Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic speaker of the House of Representatives, and others.
The Senate voted 55-45 to allow witnesses, with five Republicans joining their Democratic colleagues.
The move sparked confusion on the Senate floor and it was not immediately clear how many — if any — witnesses would eventually be called to testify.
Raskin said he wanted to call Herrera Beutler, a Republican from Washington state, to testify after she released a statement about the events of January 6.
Herrera Beutler was one of 10 Republican lawmakers who voted to impeach Trump in the House of Representatives.
In her statement, she said Republican House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy had called Trump while the attack was ongoing and implored him to call off the rioters.
“When McCarthy finally reached the president on January 6 and asked him to publicly and forcefully call off the riot, the president initially repeated the falsehood that it was Antifa that had breached the Capitol,” Herrera Beutler said.
“McCarthy refuted that and told the president that these were Trump supporters,” the congresswoman said.
“That’s when, according to McCarthy, the president said: ‘Well, Kevin, I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are,’” she said.
